alex speier

No bull: Cody Ross and the lifelong quest to be a hero

Three things drew Cody Ross to what he considered a dream profession as a child: athleticism, danger and the potential for heroism. But the venue where he daydreamed of demonstrating those traits was not a baseball field.

Ross wanted to be a rodeo clown.

“I was drawn to how brave and how fearless those guys were. When the cowboy gets thrown off the bull, to be able to step in the middle between the bull and the cowboy to take the hit to protect that cowboy, that's what I was drawn to,” Ross reflected earlier this year. “The quickness level, the agility -- they're good athletes. You have to dance around a bull. I was as a young kid very intrigued by that, what they were capable of doing.”

It was a reverie inspired by Ross’ frequent trips to see his father, Kenny Ross -- a skilled roper -- performing. Cody Ross went so far as to wear clown outfits (complete with makeup) when attending events. But eventually, Ross gave up the notion of heroism in one ring and embraced the idea of the spotlight in another setting and a different sort of uniform.

And lo and behold, some 20-plus years later, Ross is inspiring similar visions in his son, Hudson Ross, who stood behind the stage on Thursday night where his father was explaining his latest brand of heroism.

The subject? A walk-off, three-run homer in a 3-1 victory over the White Sox, the latest chapter in a largely storybook season in which Cody Ross has often interposed himself between the Red Sox and defeat.

That was very much the case when he stepped to the plate in the bottom of the ninth against White Sox reliever Addison Reed. With runners on first and second and one out, a ground ball could have meant the end of the game.

Instead, Ross unloaded on a 95 mph fastball that was in off the plate, whipping the bat head to generate what has become a familiar trajectory, a skyscraping launch that landed in the Monster seats down the left-field line.

It was the third career walk-off homer for Ross and first since 2009, punctuating a series in which the Red Sox took three of four games from the AL Central leaders. The outfielder savored it.

“I want to be the guy up every time in that situation. I always have, my whole life, ever since I was my son's age. I just like that pressure and I like just being there, in the moment. I can't really compare it to anything,” Ross said. “Just a great feeling, especially when you come through and you're a hero. There's no better feeling.”

It is a feeling, of course, with which Ross is familiar. He was one of the foremost contributors to San Francisco’s title run in 2010, delivering the game-winning RBI in both Games 1 and 4 of the Division Series against the Braves and then taking it to another level against the Phillies in the next round, when he slammed a pair of homers against Roy Halladay in Game 1 en route to a .350/.435/.950/1.385 line that earned him NLCS MVP honors.

His OPS is the fifth-best among all American League outfielders (min. 250 plate appearances), exceeding that of All-Stars such as Jose Bautista, Adam Jones and Curtis Granderson. He has been, in short, a middle-of-the-order force, and one who is particularly locked in amidst this recent three-run homer barrage.

Ross has been everything for which the Sox could have hoped and quite a bit more when they signed him as a free agent this winter to a one-year, $3 million deal. The 31-year-old turned down two-year offers elsewhere (most notably, the Braves) to go to a ballpark and town that he felt were perfect fits for his skill set and personality.

“I remember the excitement in [GM Ben Cherington’s] voice when he said, 'We've got a player who's really going to help us,' ” Sox manager Bobby Valentine said. “As an announcer, I did some of Cody's postseason and some of his San Francisco stuff. I love his smile, I love his swing, I love his energy. What's there not to love, especially tonight.

“And he's not getting traded!” the manager pronounced with a chuckle. “Don't want to start another rumor.”

While it was a night on which Ross took a bow, heroism did come with some degree of peril. As his teammates descended upon him at home plate, Ross fell prey to a phenomenon called “The Shredder” that struck (at about the same time that the contents of a bucket of Gatorade were hurled by closer Alfredo Aceves into a bouncing Red Sox throng) in his moment of jubilation.

“I felt like a bunch of piranhas jumped on me and just started attacking. I've never had that happen to me, but I assume that's what it would feel like,” Ross said. “I looked up and [Nick] Punto's staring right at me with this evil look on his face and he just grabs my jersey and just [starts] yanking on it. He became famous in St. Louis for that. They call him the Shredder. So, I got to meet the Shredder tonight.”

True to his self-fashioning as a hero, Ross confronted that specter without flinching. The sacrifice of a jersey was a small price to pay.

It would be difficult to say whether the Shredder was more or less dangerous than a bull that might have confronted Ross had he stuck with his initial career ambition. But that subject of conjecture requires little attention.

After all, Cody Ross, destroyer of baseballs, made the right decision in trading a clown’s costume for the torn uniform of his ultimate profession.

"I would think so, yes,” Ross mused of whether he made the right career choice. “Safe to say."

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